Farangis Habibi, Veteran Journalist, Passes Away

Farangis Habibi, former head of the Persian section of Radio France, passed away on Saturday morning at the age of seventy-two. She began her journalism career in 1991 and worked for twenty years at the Persian section of Radio France. Habibi studied sociology, and her doctoral thesis was about 'Women in Iran's Transitional Society.' She was employed at Radio France International's Persian section since its inception in 1991. Ms. Habibi, who also had a history of political activism, initially hosted the program 'Views and Thoughts,' which examined new books and topics in literature and intellectual currents. Before the 1979 Revolution, she was an activist in the Confederation of Iranian Students and returned to Iran after the revolution, but later moved back to France with her husband and two children. Just days before her death, her book 'The War Has Spoken to Me from Afar,' which narrates the life of this former political activist and journalist, was published in French. Ms. Habibi stated that 'this work, like any other creative work, has a hue of reality and a shimmer of imagination.' In this book, she wrote about the changing atmosphere shortly after the revolution: 'The first few weeks of the revolution were like a spring morning, blossoming and full of promise... Every morning newspapers were published without censorship, and we rushed to the university for a conference... Gradually, the demonstrations turned towards the execution of this and that; it didn't matter whether they were Islamists, nationalists, or communists; everyone shouted from the depths of their throats that so-and-so must be executed.' Farangis Habibi traveled to Iran during the presidential elections of 2001 and 2005 to cover the news of these elections. She remarked about these trips: 'These were events that I felt with my heart and soul. For someone like me, who has always worked from abroad, facing people in the streets and breathing in the vibrant atmosphere of the elections was valuable. A French journalist can never understand such a feeling.' Ms. Habibi was the sister of Soroush Habibi, a well-known Iranian translator residing in France.